1. INDIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY ROORKEE
HS 002 Ethics & Self awareness
Ram Manohar Singh

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Ethics
 The term ethics has been derived from Greek word ‘ethos’
which means character
 Also known as moral philosophy which refers to the
reflection of moral actions
 moral principles that govern a person's behavior or the conducting of
an activity
 the branch of knowledge that deals with moral principles
 It studies the moral behavior in humans and how one should act

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Functions of ethics
 Ethics seeks to resolve questions dealing with human
morality such as:
 Good and evil
 Right and wrong
 Justice and crime
 Ethics is a branch of philosophy that involves:
 Rational
 Optimal and appropriate decision-making
 Recommending concepts of right and wrong conduct

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Ethics
• Descriptive ethics (”how people behave”): Refers to factual
investigation of moral standards of a collective (society/ nation/ culture).
Describes moral praxis such as moral opinions, attitudes and actions.
• Normative ethics (”how people should behave”): Refers to Systematic
investigation of moral standards (norms and values) with the purpose of
clarifying how they are to be understood, justified, interpreted and applied
on moral issues
• Meta-ethics is the study of ethical terms, statements and judgements. It
addresses the meaning of ethical terms such as right, duty, obligation,
justification, morality, responsibility.
• Applied ethics is a part of normative ethics that focus on particular fields
such as biology, business, military

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Ethical principles
 You are a doctor in a hospital's emergency room when six
accident victims are brought in. All six are in danger of dying
but one is much worse off than the others. You can just
barely save that person if you devote all of your resources to
him and let the others die. Alternatively, you can save the
other five if you are willing to ignore the most seriously
injured person.
 Using principles of rationality and optimality you can
deduce that
Right and Wrong
Good and Bad
Justice and Injustice
Refer to Chapter 1 from the book: The nature of morality (See slide on source material)

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Ethical principles
You see some children pour gasoline on a cat and ignite it.
you see what you do because
Your prior knowledge
Theories you hold
whether it is held consciously or unconsciously
System of beliefs
Have a place in your theory or
and are the concepts they are because of their context
Refer to Chapter 1 from the book: The nature of morality (See slide on source material)

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Ethical principles
Is “execution” of criminals wright or wrong
Conflict between belief and observation
When they are in conflict, you must choose between your
explicit theory and observation
In ethics, as in science, you sometimes opt for theory, and
say that you made an error in observation or were biased or
whatever, or you sometimes opt for observation, and modify
your theory.
Refer to Chapter 1 from the book: The nature of morality (See slide on source material)

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Applications of ethics
• Business Ethics refers to written or unwritten principles and standards
that determine acceptable conduct in business organizations. Decisions
are taken by a few individuals or group of people in business
organization. However is has severe implications for large number of
people within as well as outside the organization. Therefore, the
acceptability of behavior in business is determined by customers,
competitors, government regulators, interest groups, and the public, as
well as each individual’s personal moral principles and values.

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Principles of Business ethics
• Some core principles of business ethics are:
– HONESTY. Ethical executives are honest and truthful in all their dealings and they do not deliberately mislead or deceive others by
misrepresentations, overstatements, partial truths, selective omissions, or any other means.
– INTEGRITY. Ethical executives demonstrate personal integrity and the courage of their convictions by doing what they think is right even
when there is great pressure to do otherwise; they are principled, honorable and upright; they will fight for their beliefs. They will not sacrifice
principle for expediency, be hypocritical, or unscrupulous.
– FAIRNESS. Ethical executives and fair and just in all dealings; they do not exercise power arbitrarily, and do not use overreaching nor
indecent means to gain or maintain any advantage nor take undue advantage of another’s mistakes or difficulties. Fair persons manifest a
commitment to justice, the equal treatment of individuals, tolerance for and acceptance of diversity, the they are open-minded; they are
willing to admit they are wrong and, where appropriate, change their positions and beliefs.
– LAW ABIDING. Ethical executives abide by laws, rules and regulations relating to their business activities.
– ACCOUNTABILITY. Ethical executives acknowledge and accept personal accountability for the ethical quality of their decisions and
omissions to themselves, their colleagues, their companies, and their communities.
– PROMISE-KEEPING & TRUSTWORTHINESS. Ethical executives are worthy of trust. They are candid and forthcoming in supplying
relevant information and correcting misapprehensions of fact, and they make every reasonable effort to fulfill the letter and spirit of their
promises and commitments. They do not interpret agreements in an unreasonably technical or legalistic manner in order to rationalize non-
compliance or create justifications for escaping their commitments.

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Bioethics
• Bioethics a field of study concerned with the ethics and
philosophical implications of certain biological and medical
procedures, technologies, and treatments, as organ
transplants, genetic engineering, and care of the terminally ill
• Bioethicists are concerned with the ethical questions that
arise in the relationships among life sciences, biotechnology,
medicine, politics, law, and philosophy.

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Principles of bio-ethics
 Some common principles of Bioethics are
 Non-maleficence - One should avoid causing harm. The healthcare professional should not harm
the patient. All treatment involves some harm, even if minimal, but the harm should not be
disproportionate to the benefits of treatment.
 Justice - Benefits and risks should be fairly distributed. The notion that patients in similar positions
should be treated in a similar manner.
 Beneficence - One should take positive steps to help others. Considers the balancing of benefits of
treatment against the risks and costs; the healthcare professional should act in a way that benefits
the patient
 Autonomy - one should respect the right of individuals to make their own decisions by respecting
the decision making capacities of autonomous persons; enabling individuals to make reasoned
informed choices.

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Military ethics
 Military ethics are a broad set of the collection of values,
beliefs, ideals, principles , both written and understood, that
military members are expected to uphold. These are
embedded in its culture that inspires and regulates ethical
behavior in the application of military power in the defense of
and service to the nation.
 They are usually designed to guide soldiers’ actions
 In the battle field
 Justification for initiating military force
 Decisions about who can be targeted in the warfare
 Decisions on choice of weapons to be used
 Standards for behaving with prisoners of war

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Principles of military ethics
• Country’s interest supreme : this is a moral duty towards collective
welfare and more particularly to the country (defending public/national
interest and supporting national policies, protecting the State). the duty of
military officers is to serve society, that is, "to provide that which they
cannot provide for themselves - security"
• Discipline At its core it refers to the disposition of troops to behave
properly …. there has been a tendency in many armies to consider that
disciplined conduct is a duty owed by subordinates to their superiors.
However, in broader sense discipline implies self-control and notion of
“partnership” (and thus a team spirit and teamwork, and thus social
cohesion within the troops) between superiors and subordinates,
particularly in mission fulfillment
• Courage implies risk, and then the awareness of potential dangers. If
there is no risk, we cannot claim that our action was courageous

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Geoethics
• Geoethics consists of research and reflection on the values
which underpin appropriate behaviours and practices,
wherever human activities interact with the geosphere.
• Geoethics deals with the ethical, social and cultural
implications of Earth Sciences education, research and
practice, providing a point of intersection for Geosciences,
Sociology, Philosophy and Economy.
• Geoethics represents an opportunity for Geoscientists to
become more conscious of their social role and
responsibilities in conducting their activity.
• Geoethics is a tool to influence the awareness of society
regarding problems related to geo-resources and geo-
environment.

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Source material
• Resource materials can be downloaded from
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ee0ws9uobuu7t92/AADqYBnjbg4
nqf3NY50aV3Nva?dl=0
Page 1 of http://aerostudents.com/files/ethics/ethicalTheories.pdf Gives a brief
description of ethics
Introductory chapters from the book: The nature of morality by Gilbert Harman
provide a logical introduction to the topic (Most of this book is not part of your
course)

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Social psychological theories of Ethics
and Morality

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Kohlberg's theory of moral development
• Why do people behave ethically?
• How do people develop ethical reasoning?
• Kohlberg developed a theory of moral reasoning proposing
that moral development is a developmental process that
occurs through a sequence of moral stages.
•
 Kohlberg started his research in 1950’s
 Kohlberg's research was based on Heinz’s dilemma
 Research was conducted on 75 boys aged 10, 13, and 16
 Continued to ask such questions for about 50 years

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Heinz dilemma
• A woman was near death from a special kind of cancer. There was one
drug that the doctors thought might save her. It was a form of radium that
a druggist in the same town had recently discovered. The drug was
expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what the
drug cost him to produce. He paid $200 for the radium and charged
$2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz,
went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get
together about $1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist
that his wife was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay
later. But the druggist said: “No, I discovered the drug and I'm going to
make money from it.” So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's
laboratory to steal the drug for his wife. Should Heinz have broken into
the laboratory to steal the drug for his wife? Why or why not?

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Heinz’s dilemma
Kohlberg asked a series of questions such as
 Should Heinz have stolen the drug?
 Would it change anything if Heinz did not love his wife?
 What if the person dying was a stranger, would it make any
difference?
 Should the police arrest the chemist for murder if the woman died?

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Kohlberg's six stages of moral development

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Kohlberg's six stages of moral development
 Kohlberg believed...and was able to demonstrate through studies...that people
progressed in their moral reasoning (i.e., in their bases for ethical behavior)
through a series of stages.
 One must progress through the stages in order, and one cannot get to a higher
stage w/o passing through the stage immediately preceding it.
 Moral development is growth, and like all growth, takes place according to a pre-
determined sequence.
 In stage development, movement through the stages is effected when cognitive
disequilibrium is created, that is, when a person’s cognitive outlook is not
adequate to cope with a given moral dilemma.
 The person who is growing, will look for more adequate ways of solving
problems. If he has no problems or dilemmas, he is not likely to look for solutions.
He will not grow morally.
 It is quite possible for a human being to physically mature but not morally mature.

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Moral reasoning
Process by which individuals try to differentiate between right
or wrong by using logic
 Moral sensitivity – an ability to see an ethical dilemma
including how the actions will affect others
 Moral judgement – ability to reason correctly about what
ought to be done in a specific situation
 Moral motivations – being committed to moral action,
accepting responsibility for the outcome
 Moral character – courage that is shown despite tangible
loss

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Criticisms
 Moral reasoning and moral behavior: Kohlberg's study is concerned with moral thinking,
not moral action. Therefore it is not able to explain why some people who can talk at a high
moral level do not necessarily behave morally.
 Role of emotions: Kohlberg neglects to take into account the central role that emotion
plays in morality. Given that emotions play a critical role in influencing our thoughts and
motivating our actions, it seems critical that emotion be part of the model.
 Role of culture: Kohlberg maintains that his stage sequence is universal; it is the same in
all cultures. However, when Kholberg’s dilemmas were tested in different cultures such as
India, Buddhist monks from Tibetan enclave scored lower than laypeople. Apparently
Kohlberg's model was inadequate to understand post-conventional Buddhist principles of
cooperation and non-violence.
 Role of Gender: Carol Gilligan claimed that Kohlberg’s theory is biased against women
 Kohlberg's theory was initially developed based on empirical research using only male participants; Gilligan argued that it did
not adequately describe the concerns of women
 This challenge is due to the fact that Kohlberg doesn't take into account the differences between men and women. For
example, women are more likely to base their explanations for moral dilemmas on concepts such as caring and personal
relationships. These concepts are likely to be scored at the stage three level. Men, on the other hand, are more likely to base
their decisions for moral dilemmas on justice and equity. Those concepts are likely to be scored at stage five or six.

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Source material
• Following website gives a detailed overview of Kohlberg’s
theory
http://www.cs.umb.edu/~hdeblois/285L/Kohlberg'sMoralStages.
htm
• A concise overview of Kohlberg’s theory can be downloaded
from
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ee0ws9uobuu7t92/AADqYBnjb
g4nqf3NY50aV3Nva?dl=0

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Culture
• Cultures are systems (of socially transmitted behavior patterns) that
serve to relate human communities to their ecological settings. These
ways-of-life of communities include technologies and modes of
economic organization, settlement pattern, modes of social groupings,
and political organizations, religious beliefs and practices and so on
(Keesing, 1974)
• Culture refers to the beliefs, values, behavior and material objects that,
together, form a people's way of life.
• Culture determines how we view the world around us
• Culture includes the traditions we inherit and pass on to the next
generation
• Culture: totality of our shared language, knowledge, material objects,
and behavior

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Culture
• Only humans depend on culture rather than instincts to ensure the
survival of their kind.
• Culture is very recent and was a long time in the making
• Way of life
• History and story telling
• Symbols
• Power structure
• Practices and artefacts
• Behavioral system
• Ideational system

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Types of Cultures
• High culture refers to cultural patterns that distinguish a
society’s elite.
• Popular culture designates cultural patterns that are
widespread among a society’s population.
• Subcultures are cultural patterns that distinguish some
segment of a society’s population. They involve not only
difference but also hierarchy
• Counterculture refers to cultural patterns that strongly
oppose those widely accepted within a society.
Countercultures reject many of the standards of a dominant
culture

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Moral foundations theory
 Care – Harm
 Fairness – cheating
 Liberty – Oppression
 Loyalty – Betrayal
 Authority – Subversion
 Sanctity - Degradation

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Moral foundations theory
• How much would someone have to pay you to perform each
of these actions? Assume that you’d be paid secretly and
that there would be no social, legal, or other harmful
consequences to you afterward.
• Answer by writing a number from 0 to 4 after each action,
where
• 0 = $0, I’d do it for free
• 1 = $100 2 = $10,000
• 3 = $1,000,000
• 4 = I would not do this for any amount of money

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Example 1
• Stick a sterile hypodermic needle into your arm
• Stick a sterile hypodermic needle into the arm of a child you
don’t know.

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Example 2
• Accept a plasma-screen television that a friend of yours
wants to give you. You know that the friend got the TV a year
ago when the company that made it sent it to your friend, by
mistake and at no charge.
• Accept a plasma-screen television that a friend of yours
wants to give you. You know that your friend bought the TV a
year ago from a thief who had stolen it from a wealthy family

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Example 3
• Say something critical about your nation (which you believe
to be true) while calling in, anonymously, to a talk-radio show
in your nation.
• Say something critical about your nation (which you believe
to be true) while calling in, anonymously, to a talk-radio show
in a foreign nation.

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Example 4
• Slap a male friend in the face (with his permission) as part of
a comedy skit.
• Slap your father in the face (with his permission) as part of a
comedy skit.

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Example 5
• Attend a short avant-garde play in which the actors act like
fools for thirty minutes, including failing to solve simple
problems and falling down repeatedly onstage
• Attend a short avant-garde play in which the actors act like
animals for 30 minutes, including crawling around naked and
grunting like chimpanzees.